Police: Dad Prostituted 14-year-old

Man Says He Arranged Tryst To Protect Girl

May 20, 1995|By EVELYN LARRUBIA Staff Writer

MIAMI - — Collin Winston Jones knew his 14-year-old daughter was prostituting herself, and he was concerned. So, he told police, he did what he thought was his fatherly duty: He selected a john for her and drove the couple to a trysting place of his own choosing.

Jones, 51 and unemployed, told Metro-Dade police detectives he prostituted his daughter as a way of monitoring her sexual activities. Police charged him with procuring a child under 16 for prostitution, deriving support from proceeds of prostitution, and child abuse.

"He said that she's gonna do it anyway, so he might as well monitor her," Metro-Dade Detective Dan Rivers said. "He probably honestly believes he was protecting his daughter by keeping her from going off with total strangers."

At 10 p.m. Tuesday, Jones allegedly picked up a client for his daughter, charged him $25 and drove the both of them to a rooming house where they had sex. Police have not yet identified the client.

When the girl went to school on Wednesday, she told her guidance counselor that her father had been prostituting her. School staff members called police. While the girl was turned over to the state Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services, police investigated the father.

On Thursday, Jones drove to his daughter's school, apparently looking for her. School administrators again called police, who took Jones into custody.

Rivers said he did not discount the possibility that the father had found other clients for his daughter, although both of them admitted only to Tuesday's incident. An examination by HRS doctors found the girl to have herpes and gonorrhea.

Police said the girl's mother is a known prostitute with a long history of arrests. She is imprisoned on prostitution charges.

The girl had been living with her father for the past year, police said, after having been raised by a relative in New Jersey for eight years.

Jones apparently was living at 860 NW 213th St., but also rented a small wooden storage shed at 920 NW 65th St. Neighbors said a schoolbus dropped the child off at the 65th Street address and she sometimes spent hours there unsupervised.

Dianna Floreal said she often fed the girl and tried to watch out for her until her father picked her up.

"We never knew where he took her. We were under the understanding that he was taking her to a friend's house," Floreal said. "To think her daddy was doing something like that. That's disgusting."

Jones is being held at Dade County Jail in lieu of $17,500 bail. Arraignment is set for June 8.